Saturday, December 14, 2013

Merry Fucking Christmas.

He is now especially troubled by this concept. Worried.
Fretful. Sleepless.

It might be the time of the year that lowers this weight
upon him?

He has withdrawn.

Remote.

Untrusting.

When he returns home to his lighthouse, he removes his heavy
boots and pushes them tight against the front door. If they move without him, it is a signal to
rise from his place and prepare. He is
restless, the unhappy dog that skulks, paces, cannot just be, give in
to…anything.

He double checks the locks on his back door, windows. He is concerned by venues of ingress and
egress. He needs to know he is in
control of these flood valves in, and escape valves out.

He is tension, tightly wound wire, brittle and taught.

He is the fallen angel,

sitting in his father’s antique, uncomfortable, but glorious
chair.

He is shopping at the Food Lion (roar!) and it takes a bit
before he settles down and can focus on the task at hand, buying
groceries. His panic and shake and
tunnel vision take time to melt away.
The first two isles are always a blur and he uses his coffee, in the
third aisle, to bring him back to focus, and get him back to the shopping.

Today he is definitely out of sorts. His balance is off. He knows this going in, but he needs
supplies, at least coffee and heavy cream anyway.

And after stressing and ambling just enough,

When his focus finally returns,

He hears the Christmas music.

And it is Glorious.

And it is Hell.

And his vision goes tunnel and blurry and he starts to
hyperventilate right there in front of the Tastycake end of aisle, where all
the pies are on sale, including holiday flavors, which are gloriously 5 for
five dollars.

And Murdoc muscles up and holds back the tears.

It takes every ounce of him

to keep from bursting into a sad rendition of a cheap lawn
sprinkler,

that leaks when connected,

never reaches as far as it should across the lawn,

and rusts and clogs when left alone during winter.

The song that plays above him is Herb Alpert, “The Bell That
Couldn’t Jingle.”